Mediterranean food company Yaza is selling its all-natural, low-fat labneh—a substitute for sour cream, cream cheese, and dips like hummus—to the American market packaged in 12-oz tubs of Greiner Packaging’s K3 cardboard-plastic cups, which the supplier describes as a more sustainable option.
Yaza spokespeople say the design and shape of the cup enhances the aesthetic appeal on the shelf and provides functional benefits to consumers, ensuring ease of handling and portion control.
“Given the inherently low ecological footprint of our product, the choice of packaging was a natural extension of our commitment to sustainability,” says Karim Khalil, founder of Yaza. “That’s precisely why we opted for Greiner's K3 cup, which aligns seamlessly with our ethos of responsible and environmentally conscious practices, its clear sustainability credentials were a significant factor in our decision-making process.”
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Sustainability profile of the cup
The K3 cup is made of paperboard and polypropylene (PP), while the paperboard wrap uses window cut-outs for printing and customization. The wrap also provides stability, so the cup can be produced with thin walls. This reduces the plastic usage by 32.7% compared to conventional PP cups and thus reduces the CO2 footprint as well.
In what Greiner calls its tear-off system, a consumer can separate the white or transparent PP cup from the paperboard wrap, making sure each travels into its appropriate fiber or PP plastic recycling stream. What’s more, decoration is used exclusively on the paperboard instead of the PP, keeping the PP cup uncontaminated by inks. The cup uses the same in-mold labeling (IML) lids from Greiner Packaging made from PP as previous K3 formats. The PP cup provides a good barrier against water vapor, and additional shelf life is achieved through a multi-barrier technology coupled with aseptic filling or high-pressure pasteurization.
The K3 cup can run on automated filling and lidding lines without required changes and restrictions, including lines from original equipment providers such as Bosch, Hassia, Waldner, Benhil, and Trepko.
| | For more on the K3 sustainable paperboard-plastic cup, read the following case study. |
